All this is leading up to this project. This thing is not really something I want to do. I'm basically going to put to film the issues I have with my body and my mind from the last, oh, twenty years or so. It'll be a photographic journey through bullying, body image, and mental health. Basically, I'll be chronicling the things that made me who I am today.

Interestingly I'm embarking on a very similar project. It is intended to be some type of expression of what it is to be me, having mostly to do with severe depression, anxiety and other miserie. In the past I've done it through music composition and drawing/painting but never wanted to do anything like this with my photography. It's way too far removed from my normal, perfectionist style of work. It would also involve some self-portrait work, which I'm extremely uncomfortable with. I don't allow myself to be photographed. I'm curiously absent from most family photos, much to the annoyance of my family and friends. I hate seeing myself. So this ain't gonna be easy. I totally understand where you are coming from.

I've only recently learned to smile when a camera is poked at me. Yesterday all that self-training and positive reinforcement worked! I trumped when a friend photographed me on a group bushwalk (we left the big cameras at home because of the terrible, filthy bum-skid descents and grievous bodily harm rope-assisted ascents up vertical walls. That's me with the face, in a place that really had nothing to smile about! How about that? Now people are telling me how sweet I look! Bwa,ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!!!

Taking a road you've never traveled.

This is great and I've been thinking of doing the same thing, not because of body issues as much as to experience life as a model so I can be a better photographer.

I would like you to look at Annie Leibovitz: A Photographers Life (I THINK it's this book).

I can't seem to find the image online. It's of Annie, nude, in a bathtub, of her as she is now, a little older, it's such a beautiful photo, yet in no way is it traditionally flattering to her. But yet it's SO beautiful, so telling, like looking into her soul.

Think about the beauty inside, and the beauty in the telling of your story, bring that out, the pain, don't be afraid, when you are done you will feel better, to look at yourself and truly admit and see it. There's one thing to talk about it, and another to let that emotion show and be released to the world.

I wish you luck, if you ever need help or think it would be interesting to add a section of you taken by other photographers to see how they see you in their art, I'd surely come to (Iowa?) to be a part of it

In the mean time here is another self portrait she did earlier of herself, nude, pregnant, simple, and honest...

I really wish I could find this other photo, I saw it in a bookstore but it was $80 and I'm cheap lol

I've only recently learned to smile when a camera is poked at me. Yesterday all that self-training and positive reinforcement worked! I trumped when a friend photographed me on a group bushwalk (we left the big cameras at home because of the terrible, filthy bum-skid descents and grievous bodily harm rope-assisted ascents up vertical walls. That's me with the face, in a place that really had nothing to smile about! How about that? Now people are telling me how sweet I look! Bwa,ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!!!

Looks like a nice picture of you. And a really nice place to be, too.

ME Super

Shoot more film.
There are eight ways to put a slide into a projector tray. Seven of them are wrong.

Cindy Sherman's work is awesome. David, I'm going to take a look at Jo Spence, too.

The images I'm taking won't just be self portraits. Some of them will be me, some of them won't be. The idea is to tell a story of slowly spiraling into depression, and then clawing my way out of it...because it's basically what I did. I think that it could be more powerful as a body of work if it *isn't* just me, as lots of people go through this stuff. It's going to be a lot of environmental portraiture, conceptual shots, and still lifes.

There are two photos I can have my husband help me with. Others I can probably do with models if I can find people willing. It'll probably take most of next year to do, especially if I do some of the "Middle of Nowhere" stuff between to keep myself from falling into a bad head space.

I figured out that I can't do the shot I wanted to do down the basement exactly as I've envisioned it, but I can make it work if I cover the tripod legs with something dark and futz with the lighting enough that the tripod is out of the range of the lights. It's me in a mirror, so it's going to be interesting to pull off.

No idea what's going to happen next, but I'm hoping it involves being wrist deep in chemicals come the weekend.

Cindy Sherman's work is awesome. David, I'm going to take a look at Jo Spence, too.

The images I'm taking won't just be self portraits. Some of them will be me, some of them won't be. The idea is to tell a story of slowly spiraling into depression, and then clawing my way out of it...because it's basically what I did. I think that it could be more powerful as a body of work if it *isn't* just me, as lots of people go through this stuff. It's going to be a lot of environmental portraiture, conceptual shots, and still lifes.

There are two photos I can have my husband help me with. Others I can probably do with models if I can find people willing. It'll probably take most of next year to do, especially if I do some of the "Middle of Nowhere" stuff between to keep myself from falling into a bad head space.

I figured out that I can't do the shot I wanted to do down the basement exactly as I've envisioned it, but I can make it work if I cover the tripod legs with something dark and futz with the lighting enough that the tripod is out of the range of the lights. It's me in a mirror, so it's going to be interesting to pull off.

Take the glass out of the mirror and put yourself behind where the glass used to be.